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1/3/2013 Rocket Ship Ska Trip

Starting the Home Stretch, GotchaSKAvered reinaugurated the Lollipop-of-the-Week in high style, going back to the beginning_ Barbie Gaye’s 1956 original recording of “My boy Lollypop”, 8 years before Millie Small had a global smash with it. As you can hear, the backing band on Barbie’s version laid down the very rhythmic foundation of what would become Bluebeat and early Ska: shuffled drums, a driving 4/4 walk on the upright bass, and relentlessly clipped 8th-note upstrokes on rhythm guitar, doubled by the piano_ a true ska (pre-) history lesson. Watch this spot! We’ve got enough Lollipops to fill up an entire year, and we’re gonna follow through… ‘cuz it is, after all, the most-recorded cover song in the history of ska. GotchaSKAvered, indeed! The 5@5:05 gave us 5 Japanese ska bands we only learned of in the past week, including Skylarking, Cubetone and JJ Session. Leading up to The End are a tune each from Tune In and Stay Tuned (not in that order!), and, believe it or not, Jimi Hendrix and Adele_ ska-remixed by Bost & Bim for Pirates Records. Sherwood, meanwhile, has been picking up on how sometimes a vinyl record sounds as cool at the “wrong” speed as it does at the “right” one, and occasionally, a “Wrong-Speed Special” will be aired during Sherwood’s Planet. Tommy Dorsey, featuring his trombone guy Warren Covington, cut a Decca 45 of “Satan Takes a Holiday”, and it gets wrong-speeded this week. “Freaky (January)” is the psychedelically percussiveHal Blaine’s track-of-the-month, and a well-rounded selection of ska oldies from the ’60s to the ’80s, including a few Lost Decade tracks of the ’70s, made the “Ooh” a true hop-skip-and-jump affair. Tune In… and Stay Tuned!